More than three decades after the start of the pot-powered hippie revolution, voters in six US states will vote on Tuesday on the still-smouldering issue of whether to ease laws on marijuana use.
Years after European countries such as the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and Portugal decriminalized the drug, many Americans are fuming over fresh local proposals to legalize marijuana sales of under certain circumstances.
”The United States looks increasingly isolated on the issue of marijuana,” said Peter Reuter, a professor of law and criminology at the University of Maryland, adding that Americans are less willing to be pragmatic over drugs.
As pundits focus on a possible shift in the balance of power in the US Congress following Tuesday’s polls, advocates of easing access to pot were issuing last-minute rallying calls to voters in the states of Nevada, Arizona and South Dakota and the cities of San Francisco and Boston.
In addition, voters in the eastern state of Ohio and in the US capital of Washington are to cast their ballots in local referenda on relaxing punishment for pot users by offering them treatment instead of criminal penalties.
The most radical proposal is on ballots in the freewheeling gambling state of Nevada, where voters will decide whether to become the first state to allow citizens to carry up to 84 grams of marijuana.
Under the scheme, people older than 21 would be allowed to buy marijuana in state-licensed shops rather than buying off street-corner drug dealers.
”Our war on drugs in not working and its time we admitted that,” said Nevada state Representative Chris Giunchigliani, who sponsored the initiative.
”Marijuana is now three times easier to get than alcohol and tobacco simply because it’s not regulated. I would rather tax it like cigarettes and put money into education and rehabilitation than put it in the hands of drug dealers.”
But polls show Nevadans are divided on the issue. A recent survey showed 44% of them back the initiative, 46% oppose it while 10% are undecided.
In Arizona, voters will vote on whether to allow a register of people allowed to use soft drugs for medical purposes, while toughening the punishment for those caught with marijuana without this excuse.
The move would also reduce punishment for marijuana possession to a civil fine and require a conviction before defendants must forfeit their property.
US anti-drug czar John Walters has been fervently campaigning against the proposed liberalisations, branding the movements irresponsible and saying they constituted the thin end of the drug abuse wedge.
Initiatives in Ohio and Washington would force judges to sentence drug offenders to rehabilitation treatment rather than jail. South Dakotans will approve or scupper a proposed law that would make it legal under state — but not federal — law for people to plant and possess industrial hemp, another move violently opposed by anti-drug groups.
In the traditionally free-spirited California hub of San Francisco, ”Proposition S” will allow the city to explore the possibility of growing and distributing marijuana for medical use. California and Arizona approved using marijuana for medical purposes in 1996, but the move clashed with federal laws and sent tensions soaring between the states, the city of San Francisco and government drug enforcement chiefs.
Several local authorities in the Boston area have put a nonbinding question on the ballot asking voters if marijuana offenders should be fined instead of facing a judge. But the administration of President George Bush and many voters are appalled by efforts to liberalise marijuana use. ”While I’m optimistic that our Nevada initiative will pass, we are a nation founded by puritans and some people are worried that lightening up on marijuana will make us look bad,” said Giunchigliani. – Sapa-AFP